title: Health care payments in the Asia Pacific: validation of five survey measures of economic burden.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Many low and middle-income countries rely on out-of-pocket payments to help finance health care. These payments can pose financial hardships for households; valid measurement of this type of economic burden is therefore critical. This study examines the validity of five survey measures of economic burden caused by health care payments.
  
  
  METHODS
  We analyzed 2002/03 World Health Survey household-level data from four Asia Pacific countries to assess the construct validity of five measures of economic burden due to health care payments: any health expenditure, health expenditure amount, catastrophic health expenditure, indebtedness, and impoverishment. We used generalized linear models to assess the correlations between these measures and other constructs with which they have expected associations, such as health care need, wealth, and risk protection.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Measures of impoverishment and indebtedness most often correlated with health care need, wealth, and risk protection as expected. Having any health expenditure, a large health expenditure, or even a catastrophic health expenditure did not consistently predict degree of economic burden.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Studies that examine economic burden attributable to health care payments should include measures of impoverishment and indebtedness.
authors.affiliation: Ph.D. Program in Health Policy, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA. sheilareddy@post.harvard.edu
authors.forename: Sheila R
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Reddy
authors.forename: Dennis
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ross-Degnan
authors.forename: Alan M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Zaslavsky
authors.forename: Stephen B
authors.initials: SB
authors.lastname: Soumerai
authors.forename: Anita K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Wagner
mesh_terms: D001208:Asia; D017281:Cost of Illness; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000191:economics*; D005382:Financing, Personal / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D010139:Pacific Islands; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors